Weapons cache seized at home of ex-nuke worker / Man allegedly called co-workers with threats

Larry D. Hatfield, Chronicle Staff Writer

Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, January 9, 2002

Orange County authorities seized a cache of more than 250 weapons and thousands of rounds of ammunition today they said came from a home and a storage shed rented by a recently fired employee of the San Onofre nuclear power plant in San Diego County.

A 43-year-old Laguna Niguel man, who was not immediately identified, was arrested on suspicion of making terrorist threats, authorities said.

He was being held in the Orange County Men's Central Jail in Santa Ana.

Two sheriff's deputies were overcome by fumes at the suspect's rental shed in San Juan Capistrano in Orange County, but sheriff's spokesman John Fleischman said they had been treated and released with no ill effects. They were not identified.

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"They're doing just fine," Fleischman said.

The yellow vapor came from an ammunition canister, according to sheriff's Lt. Greg Russell. It was not clear what the apparent chemical might have been.

A hazardous material team and the Orange County bomb squad responded to the storage shed when the deputies were felled, Fleischman said, but there was no further problem.

The suspect was fired last month from the northern San Diego County nuclear power plant, which is run by Southern California Edison.

Since then, authorities said, he has made an undetermined number of calls to San Onofre allegedly threatening employees and supervisors.

Some of the threats reportedly were against specific employees, but officials would not elaborate on their nature.

"He said he had a lot of guns and he was going to come back and shoot them, " said sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino. "He did threaten supervisors . . . and anyone who had anything to do with his termination."

Amormino added, "We take every threat seriously, especially those from former employees of a nuclear plant. Is the person capable of carrying out the threat? Considering we found a cache of weapons and ammunition, we think the answer is yes."

Amormino said the man apparently wanted revenge rather than masterminding a terrorist plot.

"I believe he acted as an individual, as a disgruntled employee," the spokesman said.

In a statement this morning, Southern California Edison said, "Despite his alleged threatening comments directed at employees . . . at no time was the security of the plant threatened. The comments by the (suspect) were made off site."

The statement said Edison was "unaware of any evidence indicating that he made so-called 'terrorist' threats against the plant itself as some media have reported."

Edison spokesman Ray Golden said the man had worked at the plant as a maintenance mechanic since 1984 and did not have access to the nuclear reactor.

His access permit to the reactor area was revoked in 1995, but Golden would not say why. He also declined to say why he was fired.

Russell said a friend of the suspect contacted authorities earlier this week and told them the man had threatened plant employees.

Fleischman said as a result of information given police by plant officials yesterday morning, two search warrants were issued for his home and the storage shed. They were served last night and early today.

Police said 54 weapons were recovered from the suspect's home and about 200 more at the storage shed. They said that storage locker also contained 4,000 to 5,000 rounds of ammunition and four inert hand grenades stored next to a container of explosive powder. Military grade tear gas was also found, police said.

Orange County officials planned to display the ammunition and weapons, some of which they said are illegal, at an afternoon press conference.

No other arrests have been made and apparently no one else was involved in the alleged threats.

San Onofre, 10 miles south of San Clemente and 65 miles south of Los Angeles, has been under heightened security since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Virginia.

The three-unit nuclear power plant next to the Pacific Ocean is a joint venture of Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric Co. and the cities of Riverside and Anaheim.

It supplies about 20 percent of the electric power for 15 million Southern California residents.